Active Minds strives to open up discourse
UMass club provides space for
students to talk about experiences
By Catherine Ferris

W

Collegian Staff

hen students think about where to go for
help with mental illness, some of their first
thoughts may be University Health Services
or the Center for Counseling and Psychological Health.
However, a national organization, known as Active
Minds, has been working on the campus of the
University of Massachusetts since fall 2011 to provide
a safe and comfortable environment for students to
openly discuss their experiences with mental illness,
promote awareness and stomp out stigma in the community.
Lizzee McKibben, a UMass senior, got involved
in Active Minds her freshman year after browsing
through the Campus Pulse website and seeing the
organization at an activities fair. When she first joined,
it had only been a club for about a year, but she and
other group members helped build it up to where it is
today.
Jessica Capri, a senior, and Kate Leddy, current
President of the club and an assistant editor at the
Massachusetts Daily Collegian, both joined Active
Minds their freshman year.
Capri recalled how much smaller Active Minds was
before it grew to become the Five Star Chapter it is
today.
“It was originally just a group of five people and we
would meet at UHS,” she said. Capri first heard about
the club at New Student Orientation, and has been
involved since.
McKibben said she was drawn to the organization
because of her interest in psychology, and had her own
experience with depression and anxiety in high school.
“I was looking for a club that would provide me
with a community where I could be open with my
struggles,” she said. “Because I was from a very small
school, it was very much stigmatized, and I knew talking and being open about myself was the best way to
feel better.”
Leddy found the club at the activities fair.
“I was looking for something that had to do with
mental health because I didn’t find too much support
at CCPH,” she said. “When I went to the first meeting,
I found Active Minds was a good group. It was a safe
place for people to talk and really actually change conversation about mental health, which is what Active
Minds is.”
McKibben echoed Leddy, saying she thinks the
campus culture is not yet open to talking about mental
illness.

“I really think when a group of people
with the same passion come together,
they can really help one
another and make a difference in the
University and how everyone
perceives mental health.”
Kate Leddy, Active Minds President
“You can hear, ‘talk about diversity,’ and you’ll have
people say, ‘this is my religion, this is my racial background.’ It’s very rare that someone will come up and
say ‘this is my mental illness,’” she said.
Capri stressed that Active Minds is not a place for
counseling, but rather, it was founded to improve the
existing counseling centers on campus.
“We’re here to help give CCPH feedback and to help
them better their services,” she said.
The relationship between CCPH and Active Minds is
one Capri and Leddy both describe as a “partnership.”
“Active Minds serves as a bridge to CCPH because
a lot of what prevents people from getting help is these
stigmas that we are fighting,” Leddy said. “I think
when people come here, they feel more comfortable. It
helps encourage getting help from the University.”
From the original group of five people, Active Minds
has grown to include more than 300 students, though
the number who attend meetings may vary.
“Meetings used to be very, very small, with maybe
10 people max, and we’ve expanded that to between 30
and 60 people per meeting,” McKibben said.
She also noted attendance often depends on the
topic that’s being discussed. One of the most recent
panels was on suicide prevention, and had a turnout of
more than 60 people.
Meetings are open to everyone, not just members of
the Executive Board. And as far as the E-Board positions go, Leddy said Active Minds tries to be all-inclusive when it comes to positions of power, and listed
various titles with different responsibilities.
The club comes together to plan different events
throughout the year, according to McKibben. This
month, Active Minds is organizing a “stigma tree,” a
visual representation of stigma on campus. Students
can write specific experiences or perceptions of mental
illnesses on a sheet of paper and hang it on the tree.
The club also plans to hold its third annual Walk Off
Stigma event next semester.
Both Leddy and McKibben acknowledged the
impact Active Minds has had on their college careers.
“It has given me an opportunity to learn how to
express myself without shame, to be confident in the
decisions I have been making and confident in the

COLLEGIAN FILE PHOTO

Active Minds is not counseling, but it’s an open space for people
to talk about their experiences with mental illness with their peers.
voice I have through mental health and mental illness,” McKibben said.
“Active Minds helped me in how I perceive mental
illness, and it opened my eyes to how much a group of
people can really do,” Leddy added.
But this impact isn’t limited to just club members.
“I really think when a group of people with the
same passion come together, they can really help one
another and make a difference in the University and
how everyone perceives mental health,” Leddy said.
Meetings for Active Minds are held Tuesdays at
7 p.m. For more information, visit the Active Minds
UMass Chapter page on Facebook.
Catherine Ferris can be reached at caferris@umass.edu and followed on
Twitter @Ca_Ferris2.